כי
אז אהפך אל עמים שפה ברורה
לקרא כלם בשם י-ה-ו-ה לעבדו
שכם אחד"Kee-az ehpokh el-ameem safah verurah likro khulam besheym YHVH l'avdo shekhem
echad (I will change the [Israelitish] people to a pure language [Hebrew] that they all be able [together] to call on the
Name of ADONAI, and to serve [Adonai] as one responsibility)." ZEPHANIAH 3: 9

INDEX of this page

THE NATURE OF THE HEBREW LANGUAGE
THE ETYMOLOGY OF BIBLICAL HEBREW
REAL TORAH CODES
LEARN BIBLICAL HEBREW AT HOME
SOME BASIC HEBREW EXPRESSIONS

THE HEBREW CONSONANTS

In Classical Hebrew, several consonants have a 'soft' (lenis) and
'hard' (fortis) pronounciation. Some Sephardic communities (Babylonian, Persian, Yemenite, etc.) do not differentiate between
the 'hard' and 'soft' beyt ('b' and 'v'), pronouncing both as 'b'. However, these communities often do differentiate the 'hard'
and 'soft' gimmel ('g' and 'gh'), kof ('k' and 'kh'), peh ('p' and 'f'), and tav ('t' and 'th'). Some even sound the 'hard'
and 'soft' daleth ('d' and 'dh').

אAlef = is silent, only the vowel under or over it
is pronounced. Gematria numerical value = 1

ב
Beyt = 'B'; Veyt = 'V'. Value = 2

ג
Gimmel = 'G'; Ghimmel = 'Gh'. Value = 3

ד
Daleth = 'D'; Dhaleth = 'Dh'. Value = 4

ה
Heh = 'H'; sometimes silent at the beginning or the end of a word. Value = 5

ו Vav or (Waw) = 'V' or ('W'). Value = 6

ז Zayin = 'Z'. Value = 7

ח Cheth = 'Ch' as in Scottish 'Loch'. Value = 8

ט Teth = 'T'. Value = 9

י Yudh = 'Y'. Value = 10

כKaf = 'K'; Khaf = 'Kh'. Value = 20

ל Lammedh = 'L'. Value = 30

מ Mem = 'M'. Value = 40

נ Nun = 'N'. Value = 50

ס
Sammech = 'S'. Value = 60

ע'Ayin
= 'mostly silent', some as 'gn'. Value = 70

פ
Peh = 'P'; Feh = 'F'. Value = 80

צ Tzaddik = 'Tz'.
Value = 90

ק Qof = 'K'. Value = 100

ר Resh = 'R'. Value = 200

ש Shin = 'Sh'; Sin = 'S'. Value = 300

ת
Tav (Taw) = 'T'; Thav (Thaw) = 'Th'. Value = 400

THE HEBREW VOWELS

The Hebrew vowels are lines and dots positioned over or under the Hebrew consonate. Pronounciation is usually 'consonant
first- then the vowel'. However, the 'Cheth' consonant with the 'Patach' vowel under it at the end of a word is pronounced
as 'ach'; as in 'Bach'.

Kamatz = a shortened 't' under the consonant; pronounced 'A' as in yAcht.

Patach = a horozontal line under consonant; pronounced 'A' as in yAcht.

Tzereh = two horozontal dots under consonant; pronounced 'AY' as in hAY

Segol = three dots in upside down triangle under consonant; pronounced 'EH' as in bEd

Cheerik = single dot under consonant; pronounced "I' as in sIt; If the single dot follows a Yudh consonant it is
pronounced 'EE' as in bEE

Shurek = a 'Vav' with a dot in it's center; pronounced 'OO' as in pOOl

Cholam = a 'Vav' with a dot over it or just a dot over the consonant; pronounced 'O' as in rOw

Kibutz (or Melupum [Babyl.]) = three dots in diagonal line under consonant; pronounced 'U' as in pOOl

Sheva (Shewa) = two dots, one above the other, under the consonant; pronounced 'slight E' as in bEtween OR, if in first
syllable, 'slight pause'

Chataf Kamatz = a 'Sheva' with a 'Kamatz' next to it; pronounced 'O' as in rOw

Chataf Segol = a 'Sheva' with a 'Segol' next to it; pronounced 'slight E' as in bEtween

Chataf Patach = a 'Sheva' with a 'Patach' next to it; pronounced as a 'slight A'.

Hebrew is the tribal language of the Jewish people, just as Dine'
is the tribal language of the Navajo. It is the one tongue that, throughout history, all of the various groups of Jews scattered
throughout the "four corners" of the world had in common with each other. It has even been suggested that Hebrew was the GLUE
that kept the Jewish people Jewish.

Hebrew has entered into other languages through religion and translation.
Many Psalms have made certain Hebrew words every day expressions. But, mistranslation has also been problematic. For instance;
the English word "TO SIN" (to go astray) is thought to derive from the Hebrew root ז-נ-ה
(Zana - to commit fornication; to go astray). Because this one particular word, out of the several Hebrew words meaning "
to sin," was chosen, we can understand that subconciously, sexual activity was seen as a basically sinful behavior by those
who translated the Hebrew Bible into English.

Knowing Hebrew is IMPORTANT to understanding the TRUTHS that the Hebrew
Bible contains, which book is the CONSTITUTION and SOURCEBOOK of the Israelite peoples. These truths do not come across in
any other language or medium. Knowing Hebrew thought processes also helps one to have an understanding of any of the deep
seated psychological hang-ups inherent in a culture and language based upon its Hebrew roots.

Every Hebrew word is
derived from a three letter (in some older cases, a two letter) root; in Hebrew called a SHORESH. These two or three letter
root consonants form the template or basic structure of a family of related words. The addition of vowels, prefixes or suffixes
to the basic root creates variations of meaning, tense, and parts of speach. For instance, the three consonants ד-מ-ה meaning TO RESEMBLE; and pronounced DAMAH,
is the shoresh to the words DIMAH דימה (he
imagined), D'MUT דמות (an image or likeness),
DIMUY דמוי
(a simile or comparison), DIMYON דמיון
(imagination or fantasy), MIDUMAH מדומה
(fictitious), KIMDUMANI כמדומני
(seemingly), NIDMAH נדמה (it seems).

All words that contain the same root are in some way (often difficult for English thinkers to discern) related to
every other word containing the same root.

Due to the fact that often Hebrew consonants can be interchanged for another
COGNATE consonant, many Hebrew words with related cognant roots are also related to each other, e. g. צבה meaning "to swell"; שפח
meaning "to join"; and ספק, meaning to feed.

The
famed Hebrew grammarian, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch taught that certain Hebrew consonants, particularly those which sound
alike, are related in meaning as well as in sound. An example would be the letters א,
ה, ח,
and ע which are called gutteral consonants. When these consonants
appear in similar roots, the resulting words have related meanings (Etymological Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew, by Matityahu
Clark).

As an illustration, Rabbi Hirsch explains the first two words in the Hebrew Torah (Genesis 1: 1) thus; " BERESHIT
BARA (ברשיתברא); "At the Beginning was created..." The word BERESHIT ברשית comes from the root ראש.
The root ראש is related to the roots רחש and רעש,
both of which indicate some type of movement. The root רחש
is an emotional type of movement, a feeling, an internal stirring. The root רעש
is a physical movement, a quaking, noisy, shaking type of activity. By extension, the root ראש as in ברשית
means more than a beginning, as most commentators state; it denotes a beginning of a motion, a start of activity.

The second word of the Torah, BARA (ברא), is related to the roots פ-ר-ח
(to blossom), ב-ר-ח (to flee) and פ-ר-ע (to loosen), all of which have the underlying meaning
of "emerging" or "freeing from constraints". ברא
therefore means "to bring something forth from a vacuous state" or "to create from nothingness".

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch (1808-1888) taught that the Hebrew
of the Torah owed nothing from borrowing from other languages. He felt that the Hebrew Torah was totally based in the Semitic
Hebrew-Aramaic language structure.

It is widely accepted that the language of the Egyptian kingdom that oppressed
the Israelites was a Semitic language expressed in hieroglyphic characters. The Proto-Sinaitic inscription spoken of at length
below shows the transition from the Egyptian characters to the early proto-Hebrew characters.

Rabbi Hirsch also taught
that each letter/consonant of Hebrew has a meaning of its own that represents what was previously expressed before the creation
of the Alef-Beyt characters in a hieroglyphic character. For example, in his commentary on Genesis 5: 30, he assumes
that the consonants ע and ח indicate opposing concepts. The ע
indicates movement while the ח refers to an arresting of
that movement. Thus, for example, נוע means
"to move", while נוח denotes rest and the cessation
of movement. A similar idea is found in the roots נעח
(to attract, to please) and נחם (to change attitude)
where the movement or curtailing of movement refers to an internal shift rather than a physical movement.

A group's language registers and reflects its experiences through
modes of thought and attitudes as seen in the way they understand the words and idioms of their common language. There is
absolutly no way that these words and idioms can be accurately reflected in a language so totally unrelated to Hebrew as is
English. English is as conceptually related to Hebrew, in thought patterns and mental visualizations, as the Japanese language
is to the Cherokee language.

For instance, the Hebrew word SHALOM שלום
has little in common with its English translation of "PEACE." SHALOM שלום
does not have the passive, even negative, connotation of the word "peace." שלום does not mean merely the absence of strife. It is pregnant with positive, active
and energetic meaning and association. שלום
connotes "totality," "health," "wholesomeness," "harmony," "balance," "success," "the completeness and richness of living
in an integrated social milieu." When people meet or part they wish each other שלום,
or they inquire about each other's שלום.

Similarly,
the Hebrew word RUACH [spirit] רוח and NEFESH
[soul] נפש do not have the implications of a
disembodiment, such as are indicated by the English translation. There is no dichotomy in the Hebrew mind between body and
spirit or soul. One is not the antithesis of the other. These Hebrew words have dynamic, life-giving and motor-urgent connotations.
Every living being has a רוח, even the beast possesses
a רוח (Ecclesiastes 3: 21). The same is true
of the synonym נפש, which is generally rendered in
English by the word "SOUL." But נפש, too, is the
property of all living beings (Job 12: 10), including beasts (Proverbs 12: 10). Even the neitherworld is portrayed as having
a נפש (Isaiah 5: 14). Furthermore, every living
creature, man as well as animal, is designated as נפש
(Genesis 1: 20, 21, 24, 12: 5, 14: 21, etc.). Also, both נפש
and רוח often signify strength and vigor, both
in a material and in a spiritual sense. Voracious dogs are said to possess a strong נפש (Isaiah 56: 11); and the horses of Egypt, the prophet warns, are weak; they are "flesh
and have no רוח" (ibid., 31: 3).

There is
likewise a far cry between the Hebrew word TZEDAKAH [righteousness] צדקה),
from the root צדק, "to be just or righteous," with
its implications of social justice, and it's English translation of "charity." In the case of "charity" the recipient sees
himself beholden to the donor, whose action is voluntary. צדקה,
on the other hand, has to be performed as a matter of obligation and the recipient is in no way indebted to the donor. The
needy have a right to צדקה, while those possessing
means have a duty to give it. Indeed, even a poor person who recieves money as צדקה must in turn give money as צדקה
(Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 7b). [William Chomsky, HEBREW: The Eternal Language]

THE ETYMOLOGY OF BIBLICAL HEBREW

Click the link below to view the characters of the Hebrew alphabet in a mystical kabbalistic rendition.

Biblical Hebrew is the Hebrew of the books found in the Hebrew Tanakh
(Bible), what the Christian world calls erroneously "The Old Testament.". Hebrew represents a living language that did not
remain stagnant during the wide time-frame represented within the Hebrew texts.

The original Hebrew of the 15th and
14th centuries B.C.E. was written in the proto-Sinaitic script; a script created by the Hebrew scribes shortly after the Hebrew
people left the Egyptian exile with the Prophet Moses. This script was the way Hebrew was written until the Hebrew people
were taken into the Babylonian exile in the 6th century B.C.E. Some of the Dead Sea Scrolls were written in this script, and
in a couple of scrolls the Tetragammaton; [the Sacred י-ה-ו-ה Name of God], is written in the Proto-Sinaitic script, while the
rest of the scroll is written in the Aramaic script that was used after the Babylonian exile.

The Hebrew of the Bible
represents no single dialect of Hebrew, but represents clues to several dialects, periods of time, areas of speaking, and
genres. The majority of words used represent the language as understood by the writer, and reader, during the time period
and local in which the text was written. Many words that would have been used to discribe everyday items and expressions are
missing due to the nature of the book as a sacred document. This does not mean that the Hebrews did not have words for these
missing expressions or items, but that, for one reason or another, they did not find their way into the Bible.

Petrie and Grimme date the ancient Hebrew alphabet as being created
by the Hebrew speaking Israelite people after they had fled Egypt in about 1500 BCE.

Evidence of the transition from
Egyptian hieroglyphics to a "proto-Sinaitic" alphabetic script has been found in the Sinai desert engraved on a sandstone
sphinx found in the Temple of Hathor on the plain of Serabit el Khadim.

William F. Albright and his students research
as published in "The Proto-Sinaitic Inscriptions and Their Deciferment," dates the proto-Sinaitic texts to the reign of the
Egyptian queen Hatshepsut and Thothmes III, c. 1500 BCE.

This is in the middle of the Eighteenth Dynasty, which coincides
with the enslavement of the Hebrews in Egypt and the exodus that led them to Mt. Sinai and the giving of the laws of the Torah
there.

Frank M. Cross used Professor Albright's work as the starting point in his attempt to definitively link proto-Phoenician
writing (13th century BCE), which he called proto-Canaanite, back to proto-Sinaitic and forward to paleo-Phoenician (11th
century BCE).

The interesting aspects of the differences between the proto-Sinaitic script and the Egyptian hieroglyphics,
both of which are inscribed between the paws and on the right shoulder of the sphinx, is that the proto-Sinaitic script represents
a transition away from the pictorial Egyptian hieroglyphic script, which it is a translation of, towards a less pictorial
alphabet.

Rabbi Marc-Alain Ouaknin, in his book "Mysteries of the Alphabet," posits that the proto-Sinaitic script
represented an example of the transition from pictogram (hieroglyph) to ideogram (alphabetic character), wherein the single
character would now convey the entire idea previously conveyed by the hieroglyphic picture.

He states: "Some authors
call this dual, inverse, and paradoxical movement (from "writing a thing" to "writing an idea") "iconic augmentation." We
prefer to call it an iconic paradox, since it more accurately reflects the dual inverse movement, the intricate crossover
of the image and the meaning."

Carlo Suares, in "The Cipher of Genesis," writes: "The twenty-two graphs which are
used as letters in the Hebrew alphabet are twenty-two proper names originally used to designate different states or structures
of the one cosmic energy, which is ESSENCE and SEMBLANCE, of all that is. Even though they correspond to numbers, symbols,
and ideas, those twenty-two vastly exceed all the most exhaustive sets of classes: they cannot be distributed among things
because they factually ARE that which they designate."

In other words, the letter-symbols of each of the Hebrew alphabet
consonants ARE the entire message and meaning as was in the original Egyptian hieroglyphic that they replaced.

Unlike
the English letters A - B - C - D, ect., whose "names" Ayee, Bee, Cee, Dee, ect., mean nothing , except in combination with
other English consonants and vowel letters, Hebrew consonants have an inner meaning that is represented in any word root that
the letter helps to make up; i. e. adding an "'Ayin-ע" as a prefix
to a root verb creates a noun that also describes an animal's characteristic most apparant to the name giver. An example is
"khavar" כבר (to hide); add an ע as a prefix, (ע
represents a scurrying motion), and you have the Hebrew word "Akhbar," עכבר(mouse).

Rabbi Ouaknin believes that the reason for the HEBREWS making the transition from the Egyptian hieroglyphics to the
proto-Sinaitic characters, that was the creation of the alphabet, which was later used by the Phoenicians AND the Israelites,
was due to the traumatic experience encountered by them at the giving of the Torah Law on Mt. Sinai!

He sees the passage
from a pictorial form to a nonpictorial form as directly due to the prohibition on making pictorial representations in the
Second of the Ten Commandments.

He states that "this led to a cultural revolution that deleted the image and produced
the invention of the letter as a more or less abstract sign."

ARE THERE CODES IN THE TORAH - REAL TORAH CODES

There are many claims for there being CODES in the Torah, some factual,
and some bogus. Most of those who make such claims do so from a position of having an agenda other than simply trying to understand
how the authors and editors of the Torah thought and believed.

For example, the creator of the text of the Book of
Genesis believed that the Hebrew Deuteronomic concept of God was as ONE GOD. "Shma' Yisrael, YHVH Elohaynu, YHVH echad" שמע ישראל י-ה-ו-ה אלהינו
י-ה-ו-ה אחד (Hear O Israel, Adonai our Creative Power, Adonai is ONE)!

How
do we know this?

The NUMBER VALUE of the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, ALEPH א, is 1. The letters spelling YAH (יה),
one of God's Names; equal the numerical value of 15. The 15th letter from the beginning letter of the Book of Genesis is Aleph
א- the numerical value of which is 1.

The י-ה-ו-ה Name of God (the Tetragrammaton) equals 26;
the 26th letter of Genesis is Aleph א - 1.

The Name
of God, El אל equals 31. The 31st letter of Genesis is
Aleph א- again 1.

The Name of God, ELOHIM אלהים, equals 86 and the 86th letter of the Book of Genesis
is Aleph א -1.

Thanks to the marvels of modern technology, you can obtain the materials to learn how to read Biblical or Prayerbook Hebrew
in just a few short weeks.

After that, you can also obtain the materials needed to learn to chant your own Torah portion like a pro. This is a great
tool for those who are seeking to have an adult Bar/Bat Mitzvah or who are involved in getting their child Bar/Bat Mitzah'd.

**Verbs in Hebrew change their endings according to whether the
subject of the sentence is a man or a woman (singular), or several men or women (plural). Ten women and one man is MASCULINE
PLURAL.**

The ENGLISH WORDS are followed by the HEBREW WORDS that mean what the English is trying to convey. (In Sephardi
pronounciation, Beyt ב [B sound] and VEYT ב [V sound] are often both sounded as "B"). CH together is pronounced as the CH in
the Scottish word LOCH and represents the Hebrew consonants ( ח
-כ ).